Asia: Qatar: Series race one report

Hulkenberg king of Qatar
Nico Hulkenberg wins an exciting Qatar night race ahead of both Barwa International
Campos Team men
The ART Grand Prix racer displayed a brilliant performance tonight in the first-ever GP2 Asia...

Hulkenberg king of Qatar

Nico Hulkenberg wins an exciting Qatar night race ahead of both Barwa International
Campos Team men

The ART Grand Prix racer displayed a brilliant performance tonight in the first-ever GP2 Asia night
feature race at the Losail International Circuit to claim a maiden GP2 victory.

However, things did not start so well for Nico Hulkenberg who lost his pole position advantage to
Sergio Perez at the start. Further behind the grid, Sakon Yamamoto stalled from sixth and was hit
hard by Yelmer Buurman. Rodolfo Gonzalez was also caught in the accident, but fortunately, none
of them were injured.

The Safety Car stayed on track for the next five laps even coming through the pitlane in order to let
the marshals clean the debris. Vitaly Petrov, then third, was the first of the top drivers to pit on lap
10 and this strategy allowed him to pass his teammate after the latter rejoined the track from his
own mandatory pitstop a few laps later.

Almost all the drivers chose to pit early, but one man stayed on track: Nico Hulkenberg took the
lead and managed to preserve his tyres all the while matching the pace of those who had already
pitted. He pulled away and extended his lead to over 40 seconds. That was enough time to come
into the pits, change his left tyres and rejoin the circuit ahead of Perez who earlier had gone past
Petrov in a strong move at the end of Turn 1. Hulkenberg claimed victory a clear 13 seconds ahead
of Perez. With Petrov finishing third, Barwa International Campos Team had a great result which
allowed them to close the gap on team leaders Dams.

Behind the Top 3, Championship leader Kamui Kobayashi finished fourth although his pace was
surprisingly slower than what he normally displays. He regained speed in the latest stages, but
could not get close enough to Petrov. His teammate, Jerome d'Ambrosio, finished fifth having
fought long and hard with Davide Valsecchi for that position. The Italian, second in the drivers'
championship was followed by Edoardo Mortara and Luiz Razia. Tomorrow's reversed grid will be
an all-Arden front row.